


And She Doth Appear

by mightierthanthecanon



Category: Les Trois Mousquetaires | The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas, The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Character Study, Depression, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-20 15:09:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4791968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mightierthanthecanon/pseuds/mightierthanthecanon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Not for the first time, he wonders if he can trust her. Then, he remembers the pub, the silence, the darkness in her eyes. Athos knows her as well as he knows himself, for they are the same. </p><p>He could go. He could walk out of the church right now and no one would notice. Perhaps he could still catch her."</p><p>Athos runs after Anne.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And She Doth Appear

**Author's Note:**

> Had an idea about Athos and Anne being depressed and drawn to the darkness in one another...then I scrapped it. So, here's a prologue to a story I will never write.

“By the power vested in me…”

It’s been a long time coming, Athos knows. Like many things, it’s taken far too long and, like most things, he’s rather less moved than he hoped he’d be. It’s easy for him to be a good Musketeer, a good soldier—easier than breathing at times. Being a good friend, however, is more difficult. 

Athos shifts uneasily, looking around the room. Treville gazes at D’artagnan like a doting uncle while Porthos grins from ear to ear, looking like he’s too happy to bear. Perhaps there is something wrong with him. It’s not like there’s no precedent for it—there have been no end to the pains and struggles in his life. Athos can feel the smile slip from his lips and forces them to curl upward, his thumb restlessly seeking the hilt of his sword. If only he could kill something. 

A burst of laughter informs him that something is happening and he turns, too late to catch himself. Newly married, D’artagnan and Constance press their lips together, half kissing, half smiling. Constance’s hands are around his waist, while his are pressed gently to her face, cradling her chin between his fingertips. Athos waits, as he always does, for the rush of emotion that should accompany these events. It doesn’t come. It hasn’t for years now. 

Instead of being confronted with the question of whether he is relieved or terrified, however, he hears _her_ in his ear, voice cracking with emotion.

_I want to feel hope, instead of this deadness in my heart._

Not for the first time, he wonders if he can trust her. Then, he remembers the pub, the silence, the darkness in her eyes. Athos knows her as well as he knows himself, for they are the same.

He could go. He could walk out of the church right now and no one would notice. Perhaps he could still catch her. Athos’ eyes seek Treville’s in the oppressive happiness of the church hall and find the man nearly giddy with joy, watching with pride as D’Artagnan twirls Constance around the altar. 

Athos turns to leave. He doesn’t look behind him. He doesn’t say goodbye. He’s quite sure no one will miss him.  

She asked Athos to meet her at the crossroads by sundown. She spoke so much about trust, about hope, about love—she didn’t say it, but he saw it in her eyes all the same. Athos wonders if he can trust her. His footfalls are heavy as he approaches the crossroads. The sun is warm, blood red in the distance, and he looks to see her. Part of him wants to continue, but he stops. 

It’s not a trap. She’s not trying to fight him. But still. It’s too open. It’s…oppressively open, in fact. Almost as though…Athos takes a step back. She’s playing him. But for what? Now, in the red-tinged light of the field, it seems almost comical. Hope, love, possibility. After all this time in the darkness? These lives lived in the shadows? No. That’s not in the cards for them. Ever since Thomas—Athos cuts the thoughts off with an ease born of years of practice. Unable to relax, he scans the field for something amiss. 

Nothing. Not a scream, not a shout, not a trace of sweat, or tears or blood. She sits in the carriage. He watches. She steps out. Her gown is a beautiful thing of silks and satins that puddles on the floor by her feet like ink. Like she’s the lady of the lake, still wet from the water, rising to snare and seduce him by any means necessary. Athos watches. He waits. 

Could he have been wrong? 

But no. She’s there.

It isn’t sundown, not by a long shot, but she turns slowly, almost as if displaying herself, and extends her arms. Taking one gloved hand, she pulls the fabric efficiently from her fingertips, then slowly peels the glove down her arm, around her wrist, then drops it on the ground. Before he has a chance to think, she’s back in the carriage and riding away in a cloud of dust. After a day of wondering, of worrying, the first real smile he’s felt in longer longer than he’d admit to anyone creeps onto his face. 

A game. She was never interested in hope, in love, in trust. She was chasing what he’d felt that afternoon in the cardinal’s secret room—that spark, that fire which had illuminated his world when they were married. It only finds him now in battle, or in intrigue. No doubt she had felt the same way in the belly of the criminal underworld. 

Athos walks to the space where her carriage was. Dust swirls around him like flies, making it hard to see past her. She was never interested in his love, her own hope. She’s been chasing him for years now, first from the shadows, then from under the cardinal’s wing, and now out in the open, for Athos to see. Now it’s his turn to chase her. She wants to feel wanted. She wants to feel alive. And so does he. 

The last ideas of returning to the garrison, to the musketeers, fade from his thoughts and he tucks the glove into his jacket, beside his heart. 10 years he spent running from her. He swings onto his horse and clicks his heels. No longer. 

It’s not that far until he catches up with them. The urge to overtake them is strong, but he pushes it aside as the instinct of a musketeer. Former musketeer, he corrects himself, and feels his posture and expression shift and change as he processes the change, settling into something at once more comfortable and more dangerous than the persona he’s slipped into for the better part of a decade. The air is cool on Athos’ neck, especially so, without the heavy armor and equipment he’s used to wearing, and he trails behind her at a leisurely pace, watching the carriage for any sign of movement. There is none. It occurs to him that she knows he is behind her, but the thought stirs no unwelcome emotion. Of course she does.

The sun has barely begun to set when Athos sees the carriage come to a stop, to give the horses (and the driver, no doubt, Athos has been in a carriage with her before) a break. She gets out, and Athos knows it’s as much to display herself as it is to stretch her legs. She looks glorious, as always, the satin of her gown glowing in the hazy evening mist, her hair falling in chocolate ringlets down her back. Athos recalls the feeling of it slipping through his fingers and flexes his fingers, pulse quickening at the thought. He remembers the smell of her skin, the taste of her tongue, still so familiar, even after all these years. 

Athos makes it back to the carriage before she has a chance to notice his presence and waits for her there, in the shadows. Her steps fall solid and steady on the mossy grass as she moves closer, then pause for a moment. He sits in the carriage, breathing in the smell of her, as sharp and sweet as it was the first day they met.

For the first time in a long time, he allows himself to lose himself in the remembrance of it. For the first time in a long time, he isn't burdened by the heavy weight of guilt, the chiding shadow of his brother. 

There’s a clattering noise from the front as the driver reseats himself behind the reins. He doesn't notice Athos. Why should he?

She lets herself into the carriage, face carefully painted and sculpted into the pretty perfection he'd grown so used to over the past few months. It doesn't crumble, exactly, but her expression changes as she catches sight of him.

"Athos," she says. 

He nods. 

"On your own terms, though. Of course.”

Her voice is cool, but her heart beats so fast that Athos can almost see the silk vibrating against her chest. Her heart is beating fast, and Athos gets the sense agin that he'd had in the cardinal's closet--of possibility. He glances out the window.

"You said sundown.”

She settles into the cushions, like a queen at court, and holds out her hand with an aristocratic air, waiting for the glove. "I said the crossing." So she had left it on purpose. 

He smirks, and does not hand it to her. "Is there a reason we aren't moving?" He asks voice deliberately light, and the terrified driver hurries into motion. 

She watches him expectantly,  then drops her hand, affecting irritation. 

It _is_ affected, he can tell that now, as most of her is. As most of he himself is as well. Athos watches, fascinated, the way annoyance brushes itself across her face like rouge.

"Well?" She asks, voice throaty, as their eyes meet. "My glove? I believe I've dropped it.”

His smirk deepens. “Your glove?" Athos asks, raising an eyebrow. “You mean, belonging to you?”

The air between them is charged, electric. He can almost see it sparkling in the sunset glow of the carriage.

She leans forward,  eyes twinkling, and reaches into his jacket, beneath it. "Belonging to someone," she says with a voice like velvet, eyes on his as she brushes her fingers across his neck, then his throat, then further down, warmth spreading like velvet over his skin.

"How do you know I kept it? " He asks, hissing as her hands slip under his shirt and she grazes her fingernails over his bare skin. 

The smile on her face is sharp as she finds the glove, and she draws the silky fabric across his neck, where it catches on the locket there. "I think you already know," she says. 

There it is again, the soft, even vulnerable glimmer he'd heard in her voice before. This is not the time or the place for such things, but he finds himself drawn to her. Athos catches hold of her wrist and she looks at him. In an instant, his lips are upon hers. She melts into him like she always has, but Athos melts into her as well just as easily. He forgets about the cramped carriage, the bumpy road, the terrified driver less than a foot away. 

All that exists is the two of them, all the time there is is now. The years he's spent playing musketeer fall away as he finally allows himself to experience what he's been missing for so long. _Anne_. This spark, this life that he's only found with her. Now, he wonders why he ever considered giving all this up. She breaks away from him for a moment, and he can see that she is just as affected as he. She blinks at him, mouth working as if trying to reset the way she thinks of him, then pulls herself together. As she does so, he realizes that he has completely ruined her careful hairstyle. She runs her fingers through it, bemused.

"After all these years, Athos?" She asks, fixing herself as best she can without a mirror. "You always were sentimental." 

The tone is mocking, sneering even, but the coldness in her eyes has melted, and there is is a playfulness in her expression that stirs his heart.

"Only with you," he says, and both his words and expression are honest. Her eyes widen for the briefest moment before she turns away. He can see them glisten. 

Separated from the dizzying warmth that is _her_ , Athos notices how late it's grown. Far past sundown now. He looks for the inn he knows is nearby and is greeted by the wheels of the carriage slowing down to a stop.

An inn. Alone. Together.

The fluttering he feels in his chest is still unfamiliar, and it takes him a second to recognize it as anticipation. Her breath evens out, but she still wont look at him. Still, he gets the sense that they are closer somehow. Like the bond between them is a living thing has been pulled from the water, and is now glittering in the moonlight between them.

"An inn?" Athos asks, with a raised eyebrow that he can hear in his own voice. 

She scoffs. "Those of us without king’s appointments must learn to save our pennies," she spits. "Or hadn't you thought of that?”

He had. Athos had taken his savings from where it lay in a coffer beneath his bed in the garrison. He had pawned his jewelry, and his musketeer’s coat. She didn’t need to know that, however. Not yet.

"No matter," she says, and he looks out. 

It's a small inn, rough hewn, and the windows glow with warmth. A certain kind of woman would describe it as quaint. She is not, and has never been, that kind of woman. 

She gets out to settle her affairs with the driver, and Athos is not surprised to see the feat in his eyes. She had apparently threatened him to gain his assistance. Athos smiles. Of course she had.

Waiting for her, he grabs their meager possessions—her small bag and his small pack—in one hand. Neither of them are eager to be encumbered with worldly possessions, so burdened as they have been by one another. Still, Athos pauses before the small path, and she does too. 

This isn’t just him being a gentleman, as he has done so many times before. She knows, as he does, that they must share a room together, that they must eat and drink together if they are to avoid any undue attention. He knows, as she does, that necessity is only one of the reasons they must do this. 

“Milady?” Athos calls, then corrects himself. She is no longer Milady de Winter, and he is no longer Athos, of the King’s Musketeers. He is merely Athos, and she, his wife. 

“Anne,” Athos says out loud, for the first time in…a long time, and his voice is final.

The silence stretches between them, lust, and betrayal, and trust, and mistrust, swirling between them. 

He holds out his hand.

“Athos,” she replies after a moment, and takes his hand. 

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr's just a lot of ot3s and flailing, but come say hi! 
> 
> thebriggsbrigade.tumblr.com


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